Dalton Young is the Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of Rank & Style (rankandstyle.com), a lifestyle media site that features data-driven “Top 10” lists promoting best-of products in women’s fashion, beauty, men’s clothing, skincare, kids and home categories. She joined Rank & Style from the legal industry where she previously practiced as an attorney and was the president of a technical and data-driven legal support company. Dalton is passionate about contributing to the Austin community and spearheaded the creation of Hartford Park, a new pocket park in central Austin, through a unique public-private partnership with the City of Austin. In 2020, she co-chaired The Texas Book Festival Virtual Gala and is a former member of the Elizabeth Ann Seton Board. Dalton received her undergraduate degree in English literature from Washington and Lee University and her law degree from The University of Texas at Austin. She lives in Austin with her husband, Victor, and their sons Philip and Elliot.
Category: TBF People
General category for Posts describing TBF Staff, BOD, and others.
Andrea Valdez
Andrea Valdez is the managing editor of The Atlantic. Previously she served as editor in chief of the Texas Observer, editor of WIRED.com, and editor of Texas Monthly’s website. A native Houstonian, she wrote the book “How to be a Texan: The Manual.” She is also a board member of the Student Press Law Center.
Anna Loewenbaum Hargrove
Anna Loewenbaum Hargrove co-chaired the Texas Book Festival Virtual Gala last year and currently serves on the Board of Trustees at Good Shepherd Episcopal School, the Seton Development Board and the UNC Lineberger Board of Visitors. Anna previously served on the Elizabeth Ann Seton Board. Originally from New Orleans, she received her bachelor’s degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and her masters in Special Education from the University of Texas at Austin. Anna previously taught kindergarten in New York and first grade at St. Andrew’s Episcopal School in Austin. She currently lives in Austin with her three boys and her husband Reg.
Grant Loveless
Born and raised in Austin, Texas, Grant E. Loveless is an AfroQueer award-winning student, social entrepreneur and community strategist in Central Texas. They are currently a student at Austin Community College majoring in Psychology seeking to pursue a career within Journalism and Public Policy. After graduation, Loveless hopes to serve their community as a liaison to youth and their academic or professional needs. Currently, as a spoken-word poet and well-recognized public speaker, they focus on creating dialogues centering: social and economic equity, cultural preservation and representation, youth empowerment and success as well as creative activism / storytelling.
Celebrating National Poetry Month
Happy National Poetry Month! Poetry is a fundamental form of expression and we are excited to celebrate poets this month and beyond April. Writing poetry allows us to express our feelings and process thoughts in a creative flow and cadence. Reading poetry allows us to connect and find meaning in our life experiences. To celebrate, the Texas Book Festival staff is recommending some of their favorite poems. Check out the full list below.
Idiophone by Amy Fusselman
recommended by Claire Burrows, Deputy Director
“I can’t sleep in this uncomfortable New York City cab.
It keeps moving.
It’s like the bed in The Nutcracker.”
Amy came to the Festival in 2018 with Idiophone, and her work is so full of curiosity, and brilliance, and honesty. I also get a real sense of compassion for people, and a very open love of writing, creativity, and art. These are all beautiful things to have in our lives right now. Plus, she’s just super cool.
“Six Unrhymed Sonnets” by Diane Seuss
recommended by Gavin Quinn, Programs and Financial Coordinator
“. . .I drove
to the sea, wandered aimlessly, I stared at my tree, I said
in my mind there’s my tree, there’s my tree I said in my mind,
I remember myself before words, thrilled at my parents’”
Seuss’s new collection frank: sonnets is out now.
I love the gentle flow of images in these sonnets, shifting from the world of the mundane to the natural world and back again.
“My Empire” by Kaveh Akbar
recommended by Gavin Quinn
“The new missiles can detect a fly’s heartbeat
atop a pile of rubble from six thousand miles away.
That flies have hearts, one hundred and four cells big, that beat.”
Akbar’s new collection Pilgrim Bell will be released on August 3, 2021.
In a few lines, this poem sparks wonder with the juxtaposed immense distance between a weapon with the small fragility of a fly’s heart.
“Black Woods” by Kevin Prufer
recommended by Ke’ara Hunt, Communications and Marketing Coordinator
“Do you know where our child has gone?
I’m sorry. Do you know what has become
of him? I’m sorry. [ .] Is he hiding”
Appears in the March 2015 issue of Poetry.
I grew up in Houston, which is how I know of Kevin Prufer. There’s something familiar about being in constant fear that you’re going to lose a young loved one to all that’s sinister beyond your own home. You can only protect children for so long before they’re old enough to wonder and wander beyond your reach. This poem reminds me of my younger brother, and specifically, how scary it is to be an older sister to a young Black boy in America. Even worse, I can’t imagine how scary it is to be a joyful Black boy living in this country. I don’t ever want my brother to feel trapped, but I don’t want him to become lost.
“Poems” by Nikki Grimes
recommended by Ke’ara Hunt
“I am hardly ever able
to sort through my memories
and come away whole”
Appears in the March 2021 issue of Poetry.
Oh to be human with a mind that moves, shakes, captures, and frails. Even the mightiest of us struggle to sort through our thoughts, choosing one memory over another to cherish or bury. We keep so much inside: Our mind acts as a place to revisit pleasant moments lost in time or as a gatekeeper to thoughts that we wish we could extract from our brains. All thoughts make us who we are, and personally, I like to think that my mind is a carousel and each of my memories are winding away and toward me at the same time. If I have unpleasant thoughts, I know that they’ll momentarily leave me and I can enjoy a moment of peace from their hold on me. If I revisit a thought that I cherish or that inspires me, I’m sad when it dissipates and something else stands at attention. This poem (about poems and about the weight of the mind) is one of my favorite things to return to when I catch myself drifting…
“Aubade at Bosque Redondo” by Carrie Fountain
recommended by Lois Kim, Executive Director
“Almost nothing has changed
about the world. We’re still bound
to go on having this hunch”
From Carrie Fountain’s Burn Lake (2010).
My first encounter with Carrie Fountain’s poetry was hearing it spoken live from the poet herself. It was about ten years ago and I was at a benefit where Carrie was one of the speakers. Her powerful reading stopped me in my tracks. Ok, I was already sitting, but she was (and still is) an arresting presence, crisply and evocatively delivering powerfully shaped words that say and do so much. “Aubade at Bosque Redondo” is from Burn Lake, Carrie’s first book of poetry. The poems in this National Poetry Series Award-winning book are a marvel, redolent of the New Mexico of Carrie’s childhood and imagination, conveying the personal and universal implications of history, desire, and experience. We are so lucky to have Carrie as part of Austin’s literary community. She served as the 2019 Texas Poet Laureate, also writes YA fiction, has been a Festival author, and memorably emceed the 2019 Texas Book Festival Gala. For those looking for transcendence in the everyday, you’ll want to grab a copy of The Life, Carrie’s newest book of poetry (whose cover alone will bring you joy every time you look at it) when it is out in the world at the end of April.
Borderlands/La Frontera by Gloria Anzaldúa
recommended by Lucy Vélez, School and Community Programs Coordinator
“To survive the Borderlands
You must live sin fronteras
Be a crossroads”
Meditación Fronteriza by Norma Cantú
recommended by Lucy Vélez
“Rio Grande flows
from the Rockies to the Gulf
holy waters heal the border scar”
“In Defense Of Santana’s “Maria Maria” Ft. Wyclef & The Product G&B” by Ariana Brown
recommended by Lucy Vélez
“this is as much about music as it is permission: to allow oneself
to know most music, including mexican, is black at the joints.
to be grateful to caribbeans for preserving blackness”
From Rattle #58, Winter 2017.
During this National Poetry Month, I would like to highlight and recommend critical poetry by Gloria Anzaldúa, Norma Cantú, and Ariana Brown as must-reads for anyone interested in Tejanx voices. You will be blown away by their critically candid description of a life sin fronteras (without borders).
“Abdullah Abulbul Amir, or, Ivan Petrofsky Skovar” by Unknown
recommended by Nicole Wielga, Logistics and Volunteer Coordinator
“The sons of the Prophet are valiant and bold,
And quite unaccustomed to fear
And the bravest off all was a man, so I’m told,
Called Abdullah Bulbul Amir…”
Published in The Best Loved Poems of the American People, Selected by Hazel Felleman.
I come for a long line of storytellers on my father’s side. My earliest memories with my grandfather were of him telling me these magical stories about how the robin got his red chest, and how he tutored a young Albert Einstein. I remember being mesmerized by how he just had these stories in his head that he could recite at the drop of a hat.
When my father passed away, my grandfather pulled out this book called The Best Loved Poems of the American People, selected by Hazel Felleman. My great uncle Dave grabbed it and flipped to page 281, where the poem “Abdullah Abulbul Amir, or, Ivan Petrofsky Skovar” was written. I began to read it for them and my great uncle Dave told us that he and my father, as they were similar in age, had been told by my grandfather that they had to memorize that poem and recite it for everyone during the next big family gathering. This was their version of initiation into the Wielga storytellers. During the rest of that week that I was at my grandparents’ house, every night I would read a few poems from that poetry book and it would calm me down during such a hard time of grief.
“Sonnet 55” by William Shakespeare
recommended by Nicole Wielga
“Not marble, nor the gilded monuments
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmear’d with sluttish time”
With my background in theatre, I have spent a great deal of time devoted to the bard Willam Shakespeare. While “Sonnet 18” (‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?’) might be the most famous of Shakespeare’s sonnets, “Sonnet 55” holds a special place in my heart as I had to study it in focus at college. This particular sonnet is about how this poem will forever be a reference point of the writer’s love to the person it was written about, as the words of the poem will outlive his life.
“Indian Summer At Land’s End” by Stanley Kunitz
recommended by Susannah Auby, Development Associate
“The season stalls, unseasonably fair,
blue-fair, serene, a stack of golden discs,
each disc a day and the addition slow.”
From Passing Through, 1995.
My heart breaks a little bit every Labor Day and so I have always found the Indian summers to be especially poignant as they allow us to hold on a little bit longer to that sacred season of long days unbound by the usual restrictions.
“Advice for Former Selves” by Kate Baer
recommended by Susannah Auby
“Burn your speeches, your instructions,
your prophecies too. In the morning when
you wake: stretch. Do not complain. Do not…”
From What Kind of Woman, 2020.
Thank you Kate Baer for permission to unapologetically change plans and for the reminder that we owe the best of ourselves just as much to our failures as to our triumphs. This is the poem that I should have read when I was starting my adult life yet it would have meant nothing to that focused 21-year. Now it means everything.
“August” by Mary Oliver
recommended by Matt Patin, Literary Director
“We did not know [our neighbor] was sick, but she has come to the fence, walking like a woman who is balancing a sword inside of her body.”
Printed in the August 1993 issue of Poetry.
“Days” by Karle Wilson Baker
recommended by Matt Patin
“Some days my thoughts are just cocoons—all cold and dull and blind . . . Other days they drift and shine—such free and flying things!”
Printed in Blue Smoke: A Book of Verses, Yale University Press, 1919.
“Recreation” by Audre Lord
recommended by Matt Patin
“moving through our word countries
my body
writes into your flesh
the poem
you make of me”
Published in The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde, 1997.
These verses captured or revealed with such brevity and precision an emotion or thought or state of being that I wondered, Why hasn’t it always been described this way?
Recommended Reads by Asian-American Authors
In any given year, I read a fair number of books by Asian-American authors. The breadth of books by emerging and established Asian-American authors is exciting and encouraging, and I’m frankly thrilled that there are more great books by AAPI authors than I can possibly get to tackling in my TBR pile. This was not always so, and I’m envious of kids today who can read Linda Sue Park, Minh Lê, Grace Lin, Arree Chung, and Gene Luen Yang (to name just a few) along with Beverly Cleary (RIP), Roald Dahl, Sydney Taylor, Frances Hodgson Burnett, and all the children’s authors I loved to read as a kid. I wonder what it would have done to and for my identity, my sense of worth and belonging, had those narratives been widely available and celebrated in my youth. That representation is one of the many reasons our Reading Rock Stars and Real Reads programs are so, so important. I’m definitely making up for lost time now with the rich variety in AAPI adult lit today, and I hope to see even more of it in the years ahead.
I’m of course distressed and alarmed by the rise in attacks against Asian-Americans this past year, and it’s been a struggle to make sense of that hate in the context of my work at TBF. A person who has the capacity to randomly and viciously attack another human on the street is, I would venture to guess, not reading literature. So what does the call to action to amplify AAPI voices mean when the aggressors, or those that sympathize with their racist sentiments, are not listening or interested in learning? Who are we talking to when we talk about amplifying AAPI voices if those who most need to hear that message are not going to receive it? It’s yet another reason why it’s so important for children to be exposed to the perspectives and experiences of others through literature so they don’t grow up unable to see the humanity in people who look different from them. I’ve concluded that we—the readers and writers, the ones who care about and champion the inherent diversity within the human story—have the important job of even more loudly proclaiming our support for the AAPI community, for the Black community, for the Latinx community, and for all diverse communities—to show that there are more of us than there are of them.
So read more AAPI authors with me, with TBF, and share the books you like and love with those around you, and let’s show up those bullies.
Charles Yu’s National Book Award-winning Interior Chinatown is structured as a screenplay exploring and exposing stereotypes in American film and culture through the experiences of Willis Wu, an aspiring actor who is trapped in a hall of mirrors of clichéd roles where there is no place for Asian humanity in a binary world of black and white.
Twitter: @charles_yu
We loved hosting Kevin Kwan at the 2020 Texas Book Festival for his latest bestselling novel, Sex and Vanity, where he retells and reimagines E.M. Forster’s Room with a View through multi-racial and fabulously wealthy characters on Capri.
Instagram: @kevinkwanbooks
Twitter: @kevinkwanbooks
If you missed reading Ocean Vuong’s poetic and celebrated debut novel in 2019, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is most definitely worth picking up, with a narrative constructed a Vietnamese son’s letter to his illiterate mother.
Instagram: @ocean_vuong
I knew A.H. Kim in my childhood when our parents were part of a close immigrant community in Buffalo, New York, and am so proud that she’s published her first book, A Good Family, that’s a page-turner about family members behaving badly, with vivid details on the lives and flaws of the aspirational class.
Instagram: @ahkim.writer
Twitter: @AhkimAuthor
Susan Choi, another TBF alum who was at our 2019 Festival for her National Book Award-winning Trust Exercise, is a book I’m still thinking about, with its complex narrative structure, unreliable narrators, and layered treatment of adolescence, power, and abuse.
Instagram: @susanmchoi
Shirkers filmmaker Sandi Tan’s newly released Lurkers details the lives of three families who live on Santa Claus Lane in an LA suburb that feels very LA in the you-don’t-know-your-neighbors kind of way. Its dark humor and subject matter are not for the sentimental, but perfect for readers who will appreciate Tan’s cinematic style, unflinching portrayal of race, family dynamics, sexual predation, and alienation.
Instagram: @_sanditan_
Twitter: @sanditan
Don’t be intimidated by the page count in Chang-Rae Lee’s latest masterpiece, My Year Abroad. Just jump in and ride the waves of this wildly creative and crazy narrative. Lee’s latest is a departure from his more somber earlier work. Here, you meet and fall in love with Tiller, a somewhat lost college student looking for purpose and direction, and the mesmerizing Pong, a Chinese entrepreneur chasing fulfillment via material excess and chemistry-laden concoctions. Tiller is haunted by the past as he tries to find absolution in the present and his place in the disorienting landscape of American materialism, tribalism, complacency, dishonesty, and aspiration. Lee writes with such precision that you can’t help but experience the novel as both the very entertaining/disturbing story of Tiller’s experiences and the telescoping out to an ever-widening lens on the American condition of hope, longing, and dislocation. Lee’s writing is exuberant–sentences that hum and sing, chock-full of clever allusions and philosophy. It’s a surfeit but go ahead and feast along, just like his characters do.
Staff recommended stories by Beverly Cleary
We bid farewell to the children’s author Beverly Cleary, who spent her life writing books about beloved characters Henry Huggins, Ramona Quimby, and Ralph S. Mouse. Cleary was a librarian, committed to sharing the joy of reading with children and families. Below is a list of favorite stories by Cleary shared by TBF staff members.
“As the youngest sister, I’ve got to go with Beezus and Ramona (1955).” – Lois Kim, Executive Director
“Beezus and Ramona (1955).” – Gavin Quinn, Programs and Financial Coordinator
“Ramona the Brave (1975) and The Mouse and the Motorcycle (1965).” – Claire Burrows, Deputy Director
“Ramona Quimby, Age 8 (1981).” – Susannah Auby, Development Associate
“As a cat lover, Socks (1973).” – Nicole Wielga, Logistics and Volunteer Coordinator
“Great memories being a teen reading Fifteen (1956) and Sister of the Bride (1963) during the summer.” – Ke’ara Hunt, Communications and Marketing Coordinator
“Dear Mr. Henshaw (1983), not only because it’s an epistolary and I love epistolaries, but also because it’s an epistolary between students and their favorite authors!” – Matt Patin, Literary Director
Share your favorites with us by commenting and tagging us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
Susannah Auby
Susannah Auby serves as Texas Book Festival’s Development Director. She received her MBA from Columbia University and her bachelor’s degree from the University of California at Berkeley. Prior to joining Texas Book Festival, she was a volunteer in Austin in many roles focused on education fundraising, literacy outreach, libraries, and her greatest passion, introducing children to books and all the magic that they offer. Her prior professional experience was in New York and included management consulting, strategic planning, and financial analysis.
Ke’ara Hunt
Ke’ara joined the Texas Book Festival in 2021 and is responsible for coordinating and executing the communication, marketing, publicity, and messaging efforts across multiple channels. She holds a master’s degree in Television Producing & Management from Boston University and a double bachelor’s degree in Radio-TV-Film & English from The University of Texas at Austin. Prior to joining the Texas Book Festival, she worked in entertainment and events with SXSW, Austin Film Festival, Austin Film Society, and The Ellen Degeneres Show.
In her spare time, she teaches in the Radio-TV-Film department at Austin Community College. You’ll probably catch her rewatching Joe Wright’s Pride & Prejudice and over-analyzing Mr. Darcy’s famous hand-twitch while patiently waiting on George R.R. Martin to release The Winds of Winter.